Dash Shaw asks for help with his new animated film

Last weekend I ran into writer/artist Dash Shaw, and he filled me in on his latest project, an animated film called The Ruined Cast.

Shaw has been working on the flick for awhile, partly with the help of the Sundance Institute's Writing and Directing Labs. (It's being co-produced by John Cameron Mitchell, director of Rabbit Hole and Hedwig & the Angry Inch.)

Like much of Shaw's work, the movie won't look like anything we've ever seen on the big screen before -- and that's why he's turning to Kickstarter to help raise funds.

"The burden of proof is on us to illustrate it first," he says. "This takes funding for materials, production space and labor. ... As the teaser suggests, the movie will be painstakingly animated by hand -- it requires paints for backgrounds, lots and lots of paper, lots of pens, scanners and cameras to capture "live" paintings."

You can read a synopsis of the sci-fi story and see a teaser on his Kickstarter page, which also includes incentives to donate, like a limited-edition print from the film, a DVD of the feature and your face drawn in the movie.

Dash hopes to complete his $25,000 goal by May 8. Below are a few screen grabs to entice you:

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About Whitney Matheson

Whitney has been writing about pop culture for USA TODAY since 1999, when Pop Candy began as a weekly column. Her interests include music festivals, mustaches, Lost, comic books and Andy Warhol. She lives in New York City. More about Whitney | E-mail Whitney